


The Old Age of the World

by Argyle



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Victorian, Gen, Pre-Slash, Street & Stage Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-29
Updated: 2011-06-29
Packaged: 2017-10-20 20:26:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/216785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Argyle/pseuds/Argyle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A beginning of sorts: Charles and Raven attend a stage magic performance only to make an unexpected discovery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Old Age of the World

**Author's Note:**

> Victorian London AU! I have a fairly good idea of where I'd like to take this, but I figured I'd test the water to see just how ridiculous of an idea it is before putting an awful lot of effort into it ;) Watch for likely anachronistic dialogue.

It was well past midnight when Charles stumbled into the flat, drunk half on bitter and half with the still-sweet rush of standing before his colleagues to receive his degree. He'd always been confident in his studies. But few things matched the thrill of a chase completed, and of a job well done. Even the stiffest of his fellow naturalists were impressed with his research, and moreover with Charles' calculations on the rate of variation in natural things. The potential of beasts beyond reckoning...

"What little the boys in the field club really know," he murmured tiredly. Many was the time Charles wished he could show himself for what he truly was: most unusual, and a veritable case study of his findings. But save for Raven, the secret of his abilities remained just that.

He dropped his hat and gloves on a side-table, and shrugged out of his rain-heavy cloak, letting it fall to the floor. When he looked up, Raven's gaze was there to meet him.

"You're wet," she said. She was tucked in one of the wing chairs to the back of the common room, a novel held open on her lap. The lamp light made her skin seem bluer than Charles was used to, more severe against the white of her nightdress. But of course that was just an illusion.

"And you're awake," said Charles. "Are you well?"

"Couldn't sleep," Raven admitted.

"Have you been practicing the techniques I taught you? You must _relax_ your mind." Charles toed off his shoes, not wanting to muddy the carpet as he moved towards the bar and served them both a measure of sherry.

Raven took it, staring down a moment before replying, "You should have let me come with you tonight."

"Don't let it trouble you. Nothing but a lot of raucous nonsense." Charles sat on the chair arm and gave her shoulder an encouraging pat. "No place for--"

"For a what?" Raven shifted then, suddenly taking the form of a man about Charles' age, but lankier, ginger and bespectacled. If only in appearance, he would admittedly be quite at home amongst Charles' acquaintances at Oxford.

As though sensing Charles' thoughts, Raven pressed on, her voice reedy but masculine, "I can pass, Charles. What makes you think I couldn't do it without your knowledge? That I wouldn't?"

Charles drained his glass. "Enough, Raven." He waited for her to turn back before he continued, "Listen. We'll go out on the town together soon. Just you and me, and you can choose the location."

"Right. Like the time you took me to the library for my birthday?"

"There's nothing quite as valuable as the gift of knowledge," he laughed. Then, shrinking a bit from that amber glare, "I promise, my dear. In honor of _my_ degree ceremony, we'll go where _you_ want."

Raven turned to the end-table and rifled through a stack of letters, producing a small playbill card. "I have an idea."

"Yes?" Charles took it from her. "Wherever did you get this?"

The print was of poor quality, but legible. It read as follows:

 _The Incredible Magneto_

And in smaller letters underneath:

 _Observe the Uncanny Ability of One Man to Access a Power Beyond Physics_

Then below that:

 _Steel Yourself for an Evening of Wonderment!_

And after, in slightly larger letters:

 _Live on Stage, Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly_

In the center was a careful if outlandish sketch: a cloth-masked and cloaked man gripped one end of a metal bar in each hand, and the bar itself bent into a neat knot.

"A magic show?" Charles asked, looking up from the card. "Really, Raven. Not really your style, is it?"

\---

A week later, they stood together in front of the Egyptian Hall. Charles didn't care for the look of the place -- it was a garish building, quite at odds with its more sensible English-bred neighbors, and the glyphs which ran up and down the front hinted more at damp mockery than occult mystery.

Raven however was transfixed.

"It's wonderful," she said, her gloved hands clasped before her. She looked about, taking in the myriad hansoms, and all the smartly dressed patrons who mulled about by the theatre entrance.

Charles felt the rush of her pleasure: she'd manifested her gown from a photograph she'd seen in a fashion magazine, and she was now the object of many a society woman's envy.

Even then, atop all that, there came wave after wave of excitement, distraction, even trepidation and displeasure, each emotion layered with the chortle of the crowd: "They say he's German," and, "...never before seen such a sight," and, " _Monstrous_."

It was too much.

Breathing deeply, Charles attempted to settle his thoughts. To be true, he loathed being in an audience: it was difficult to shut out so many minds at once, and to focus for any amount of time on the stage.

But this was for Raven, he reminded himself. Raven, infinitely patient with his late-night pub visits, and his later-night study sessions. Whether or not it all led to a permanent lecturer position, or a more probable stint as a for-hire researcher (how that made Raven laugh), he certainly owed her this much.

Charles took her arm and they walked together into the foyer. The theatre's interior, he noted with relief, was slightly easier on the eye, the stone angles softened by draped tiers of sumptuous red velvet.

They checked their coats and made their way to their seats: second row. He'd splurged on the tickets. When Raven asked him the same, he nodded and said simply, "If we're to do this, we must do it well."

"It's your money," Raven said with a shrug, but her tone was playful. Charles didn't need to read his sister's mind to recognize her satisfaction.

Within minutes, the noise of the crowd fell to a murmur and the hall filled with the drone of the orchestra warming up, a steam train tremolo of strings and brass.

"Bit of mood music, I imagine," Charles said.

And indeed it was: the curtains parted, revealing a sparse set made up of scarcely more than several stacks of iron rods, some barbells and an anvil, and a heavy-looking burlap sack laid to the side. The backdrop featured a few sets of concentric circles, all of them alternately black and white, likely left over from a hypnotist's act.

A moment more passed.

And then without preamble, the Incredible Magneto appeared from the wings. He walked slowly, and with purpose -- though that was little wonder. A a medium-sized cannon ball hovered several inches above his outstretched palm, stable in the air as though stuck mid-toss.

"Strings, don't you think?" Raven asked, her eyes on the stage. "Charles?"

Charles knew he'd gone ashen, though his heart raced. He felt such _power_ in this man. Energy barely contained, as though this was just a parlor trick for him, and of course it was.

The ball rose up a few inches before Magneto turned his hand, and then it fell towards the stage floor -- surely it would smash through! But oh, the ball halted a hair's breadth from the wood, touched, and gently rolled to the lip of the stage before coming to rest.

Here the audience erupted in applause: this, they all thought, was not bad.

Raven clapped too, her smile spreading to the hazel eyes she lately preferred to go out in.

Charles was still too dumbfounded to move. He couldn't help but push into the man's mind. Just a single tendril at first, and another: yes, he thought, and took in the whole of him. _Erik Lehnsherr_. German. Consumed with the will to control; and anger; and the horror which to him was the truth of what it meant to be so markedly different.

Like Charles. And like Raven. Most unusual beings, all.

 _This is not what you're meant for_ , Charles projected, not really meaning to. He thought he saw Erik's head turn at that.

But it was perhaps only a trick of the light. Erik moved a hand and the sack began to empty its contents -- but more, they _rose_ out -- and a thirty-foot-long metal chain, as lithe as it was cumbersome, stretched out before him in the air, then coiled in, snakelike.

Slowly, too slowly, the chain spread out again, only to begin wrapping round Erik's tall, taut frame. Boots first. Then legs, arms and across his chest, halting just when it reached his shoulders.

Charles scanned him again, sensing no panic. He knew: Erik had done this so may times. London was merely the latest stop on his tour, the most recent place he had searched for-- whom, exactly?

"Look!" a man several rows behind Charles shouted.

A gentle chinking sound could be heard over the din of the crowd. One by one, the links began to split, the glint of breakage moving back down Erik's body. In another minute, he was surrounded by neat portions of split chain, and free.

"Raven," Charles whispered. And then, soundlessly, _We are not alone._

***

After the show, Charles and Raven lingered by the stage door. Charles scanned the crowd in snatches, listening in as each patron retreated into the night in cab or on foot -- he hoped to find some _clue_ to all this, uncover someone with knowledge of Erik's abilities, or perhaps sense another person who had seen something greater than a magic act, as he had.

In this, he was unsuccessful.

Indeed, more and more of them went away feeling enchanted with the trick but forgetful of the man behind it. They chose to focus only on the spectacle. To them, Erik's display had been no better and no worse than any other stage magician they saw, and for years the town had been saturated with such performers, charlatans, and false soothsayers. They ever hungered for the next to come.

Charles felt Raven huddle into her cloak, more impatient than cold. "We'll come back to look for him," she said. "I enjoyed it, Charles. His stage presence--"

"He shouldn't _have_ a stage presence, Raven," Charles replied, more pettishly than he intended. He let out a sigh. "None of us should be reduced to a side-show. Our abilities do not give the public _carte blanche_ to scrutinize us."

Raven's mouth quirked. "Scrutinized?" she said. "They don't know about us. When they look at Erik, he is never anything else _but_ a side-show. If you're right, if we're not alone, than you can't spite a man the option to be something you don't approve of. Not all of us come from such advantaged beginnings."

Charles flashed back to the night he found her, frightened and utterly alone. But one of his _kind_. "My only advantage is having you by my side, Raven."

"Flattery will get you nowhere."

"Shh." Just then, Charles sensed their quarry: _Erik_. He reached out into the dissipated crowd, searched for one mind among many--

Erik stood facing them not a dozen feet away, his body tense but his thoughts more curious than hesitant. He wore a dark Inverness coat, no gloves, and a scarf knotted at his throat, ruddy against pale flesh. It was the first time Charles had truly seen his eyes, though the mask Erik wore on stage could hardly be expected to protect his identity. His gaze was reddened, watery.

At once Charles felt too soft, more the product of books than life. But he ventured, "Erik, wait."

"What do you want?" Erik bit out, his accent sharp but clear. "It is me you're waiting for, yes? I'm sure it's not an attempt to secure an autograph for the lady."

"No," Charles agreed. He took a step forward, but held a hand behind him to keep Raven back.

"Then what?"

 _Calm yourself, Erik_ , Charles sent. _I believe we have much on which to speak._

Erik paused, just for a fraction of a second, but enough to strengthen Charles' confidence. "Who are you?"

"A friend. I hope," Charles pressed on. "There's no need to go on fighting. We each possess a gift--"

"You know nothing of it," Erik said, pushing his hands into his pockets. With a glance over his shoulder, he was on his way, tracing a path into the night. Charles saw the hansom stop at the street corner, and then Erik was inside.

He heard one thought before Erik was gone: _Do not try to find me._

A challenge, then. Charles couldn't feel defeated; for the time, it was enough to simply have discovered.

Raven moved up beside him, pressed a hand to his arm. "What now?" she asked.

"Now," said Charles, "we know. And we make our move."


End file.
